Awarded as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the grant is the largest ever received by the Kansas Geological Survey. It will be used to determine whether a largely depleted oil and gas field in south-central Kansas and an underlying saline aquifer can permanently and safely sequester carbon dioxide from stationary sources such as electric, cement, ethanol and fertilizer plants.

A collaborative effort between government and industry, the three-year project will include scientists from the Kansas Geological Survey, KU and Kansas State University departments of geology and two Wichita-based firms—BEREXCO Inc. and Bittersweet Energy Inc. Kansas Geological Survey geologists Lynn Watney and Saibal Bhattacharya are leading the investigation.

CO2 sequestration is in the early phase of implementation globally. We will be evaluating the sequestration capacity of depleted oil fields and deep saline aquifers and are aiming to develop an effective carbon-sequestration model that is tailored to the Kansas industry and economy.

—Lynn Watney

Research will be done on the Wellington oil and gas field in Sumner County south of Wichita, which has produced 20 million barrels of oil since 1927.

Subsurface rock units in the Wellington field, which once held the large quantities of oil and gas, will be evaluated through drilling and other geophysical methods to determine their capacity to securely contain CO2 in the future. The project is a subsurface characterization investigation and will not include any sequestration of CO₂.

In addition to investigating the possibilities for CO2 sequestration in oil and gas fields, the researchers will model the use of industry-emitted CO₂ to squeeze out trapped oil and gas unreachable by traditional methods.

They will also study the suitability of the Ozark Plateau Aquifer System—mainly composed of Arbuckle Group rocks—for sequestration in a 17-county area. The highly saline water in the aquifer, which is about 4,000 feet beneath the surface in south-central Kansas, is not usable for other purposes and is isolated from shallower freshwater aquifers by impermeable rock units.

Besides reducing the amount of CO₂ discharged into the air, successful geologic sequestration of CO₂ could lead to the development of a new industry in the state. The Ozark Plateau Aquifer System and the Wellington field, as well as other oil and gas fields that produce from the same rock units, are centrally located near multiple sources of emissions that could be captured and stored.

The Kansas Geological Survey also will be collaborating on another Department of Energy-funded, Kansas-based CO2 sequestration project with the Southwest Partnership on Carbon Sequestration and the Wichita-based firm, CAP CO2, LLC.